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TRENTON
- Racing Commission Executive Director Frank
Zanzuccki announced today that a Racing
Commission investigation has resulted in
the first positive test results obtained
under the state’s recently-expanded
testing protocols aimed at detecting the
use of performance-enhancing substances
in race horses.
Racing
Commission investigators oversaw the drawing
of fluids from horses at the Commission-licensed
Winner’s International Farm in Chesterfield,
Burlington County, last month. Laboratory
tests subsequently confirmed that six harness
race horses under the care of trainer Ernest
Adam and owned by Commission-licensed owner
Stephen C. Slender, DVM, had tested positive
for the performance-enhancing drug Erythropoietin-Human
(EPO). The six harness horses have been
declared ineligible to compete in New Jersey
racing, consistent with the rules of the
Racing Commission’s new “out-of-competition”
testing initiative.
New Jersey State Police searched the farm
where the six horses had been kept earlier
today. Based on lab results and other information
obtained during the investigation, the Racing
Commission will now conduct a hearing to
determine whether Adam and Slender have
violated Commission rules. The Commission
is in the process of issuing Adam and Slender
Notices of Hearing, which list their alleged
rule violations.
Pending the outcome of their respective
hearings, both men remain eligible to participate
in New Jersey racing. Under Racing Commission
rules, a trainer is the absolute insurer
of, and is responsible for, the condition
of a horse within his or her care and custody.
Violations of the state’s testing
rules are punishable by a 10-year license
suspension and $50,000 fine.
-more-
The six horses identified as having tested
positive for EPO have all raced at Freehold
and the Meadowlands in New Jersey this year,
and have raced at tracks in New York and
Pennsylvania as well.
The
six horses are: Art Maker, who last raced
this past Sunday at Chester Downs, Pa.;
Jeremy’s Successor, who last raced
at the Meadowlands in New Jersey on Sunday;
Jovial Joker N, who last raced at Saratoga,
N.Y. on Sunday; JW Dutch Treat, who last
raced at Yonkers, N.Y. on April 24; Pacific
Playboy, who last raced at Chester Downs,
Pa. on Sunday; and Western Mac, who last
raced at Chester Downs on April 20.
The
Racing Commission’s out-of-competition
testing program was launched in late 2007.
It began following adoption of a new rule
that expanded the Racing Commission’s
ability to test horses for illegal substances
by authorizing testing not only at racetracks,
but at horse farms -- and at any time. Previously,
the Commission was only authorized to conduct
testing of horses on race day, and only
at New Jersey’s four racetracks.
Zanzuccki explained that the testing program
is necessary to detect the improper administration
of blood doping agents such as human EPO,
which is improperly used in race horses
to improve the animal’s performance.
EPO artificially increases red blood cells
and hemoglobin, and can therefore enhance
oxygen consumption during racing. The use
of human EPO products is dangerous to the
well-being of the horses, because it causes
unnatural increases in blood viscosity,
which can lead to heart attack or stroke
during intense exercise. In addition, EPO
is a human pharmaceutical product never
intended for use in horses, and never approved
for such a purpose. Use of the drug in horses
can trigger an immune response, such that
the horse begins to destroy not only the
human drug, but its own natural equine EPO.
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